This invention relates to an automatic sewing machine for automatically stitching free side edges of work pieces of flexible material while properly positioning the free side edges of the work pieces.
When overedge stitching is performed on a work piece, or when free side edges of two superposed layers of fabric are stitched together by a predetermined distance along the side edges while the side edges are aligned with each other, it is difficult to properly feed the fabric with respect to the sewing machine mechanism. Especially, when two free side edges having different configurations are to be stitched continuously in a high speed sewing machine such as an industrial sewing machine while the free side edges are aligned with each other, such an operation in a high speed sewing machine is almost impossible. In such operation, it has been a conventional practice that a machine operator intermittently stitches free side edges of layers of fabric together while manually aligning succesive portions of the edges with each other, but this conventional operation consumes a great deal of time and labor. Of course, in a sewing machine exclusively designed for attaching a collar or cuff to the body of a garment, various attempts have been made to perform such operation automatically, but the conventionally proposed automatic stitching processes can not accomodate a great variety of fabric configurations and lack versatility.